1. What is the exact role of PIN proteins in PAT? 2. How is PIN polarity established, and how is it modulated by AGC kinase-mediated phosphorylation? 3. What is the role of the AGC kinase, as modulators of PAT, in translating environmental signals, such as gravity, light or mechanical stress, to plant…

Early treatment benefits patients who have not fully developed rheumatoid arthritis but are in the preliminary stages of the disease. This is what researchers from the Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC) have reported in The Lancet. Patients in the pre-arthritis stage who were temporarily prescribed…

The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) has awarded Veni funding to seventeen researchers who recently obtained their PhD. This award offers promising young scientists the opportunity to develop their own ideas over a period of three years.

The lipids in the uppermost layer of the skin, the stratum corneum (SC), play an important role in the skin barrier function. The three main SC lipid classes are ceramides (CER), cholesterol and free fatty acids.

We examine how soil inoculation influences aboveground organisms (i) directly, and indirectly via (ii) its effects on plant chemistry or volatile emission, or via (iii) mediating the effects of belowground pathogens on aboveground organisms via the shared plant.

Which immune mechanisms are involved in host defense against Staphylococcal infection?

Can drugs that target host signaling pathways be used to eradicate antibiotic-resistant bacteria?

Heart patients who maintain a healthy lifestyle can start earning discounts at shops or for trips out. The Tergooi Hospital is the first in the Netherlands to introduce this unique method that was co-developed by the research group headed by Professor of Health Psychology Andrea Evers and the Leiden…

Professors Simcha Jong (Leiden University) and Rifat Atun (Harvard University) convened an exploratory seminar to discuss challenges for health systems in realising the potential of precision medicine at Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies in Cambridge, MA on 17 April 2017.

Researchers at the Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC) have managed to culture human heart muscle cells on a massive scale. This is an exceptional achievement because it is very difficult to replicate heart muscle cells outside the body. Using a special technique, the researchers have now created…

Utilization of plant-originated products as new antibiotics

How is Pol θ responsible for T-DNA integration, and how do other DNA double-strand break repair pathways interact with Pol θ? How may we manipulate T-DNA integration to stimulate error-free integration at a predetermined genomic site?

With this thesis the PhD-candidate aims to enrich the body of evidence concerning the relation between stress and health, and the mediating role of (un)conscious perseverative cognitions, which is captured in the extended perseverative cognition hypothesis.

What are the biological and biophysical mechanisms that control chemokine gradient sensing and migration of immune, endothelial, and tumour cells in tumour development?

What are the host immune defence mechanisms that control intracellular infections and how are these subverted by pathogens?

How do plant defense genes get activated?

On January 24 Professor Annemarie Meijer and Dr Sander Wezenberg received a NWO grant for their research. The grant was awarded within the Open Competition Domaine Science-M programme and is intended for innovative research areas that can form the basis for the research themes of the future.

Research groups in the Biological & Soft Matter Programme unravel mechanisms in biological processes and develop novel bio-inspired soft materials.

The LUMC has a longstanding tradition researching the role of the immune system in infectious diseases, transplantation and auto-immune diseases.

The predication of the effect (efficiency and toxicity) of a drug in a patient is very important in (i) clinical decision support and (ii) the development of novel drug treatments. We apply our technology and methods to find biomarkers for key disease pathways and toxicity in clinical studies and in…

As a result of an increased life expectancy, more people suffer from chronic diseases and discomfort. Elderly patients may have multiple diseases simultaneously, with concomitant multiple medications.

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide.

Three Psychology students will present a poster of their thesis research on Alzheimer’s and dementia at the international conference AAIC Neuroscience Next. ‘I remind myself to recognise - without fear or shame - when I don't know something.’

PhD defence

The objective of the Next Generation ImmunoDermatology project (funding NWO, program NWA-ORC) is to deep profile the immune-mediated inflammatory diseases: i) atopic dermatitis (AD), ii) cutaneous lupus erythematosus (CLE) iii) chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) iv) hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) v)…

How do you detect people at high risk of heart attacks and strokes? And how can we improve the treatment of atherosclerosis? These are the questions that keep LACDR researcher Marie Depuydt busy. She is investigating the immune cells that contribute to the worsening of atherosclerosis. ‘It's a challenging…

The Aging and Immunity group is led by Dr. Amanda Foks. In this group we aim to investigate how aged immune cells contribute to atherosclerosis and identify novel therapeutic targets and strategies to extend health span and inhibit cardiovascular disease.

How can you use robots and automatic recognition of microscopic images to test the effect of drugs exceptionally quickly?

The company Azafaros was established in 2018 to translate innovative science from Leiden University and Amsterdam University Medical Center into novel disease-modifying treatment modalities for rare genetic metabolic disorders such as lysosomal storage diseases.

In order to be able to develop effective medicine and treatments to prevent or cure autoimmune diseases or cancer we need to understand the mechanisms how they arise and what drives their course.Unravelling the fundamental molecular mechanisms influencing the onset and course of diseases such as allergies,…

Overkleeft

How can we extend the drug residence time to combat diseases more effectively?

The Horizon 2020 project CoSTREAM aims to improve our understanding of the co-occurrence of stroke and Alzheimer’s disease. It has long been known that both diseases share underlying causes, but their exact interaction or link is not fully understood. CoSTREAM combines multiple factors to identify and…

Advanced mass spectrometry of glycosphingolipids takes the central stage in this thesis. Investigations focus on characterization of glycosphingolipid metabolism in health and disease with emphasis to the detection and accurate quantitation of known and so far unknown glycosphingolipids and closely…

Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease affecting millions of people world-wide.

Dr. Jessica Kiefte-de Jong and Dr. Thijs Bosker, both Assistant Professors at LUC, have been awarded by The Leiden University Fund (LUF).

Lecture

PhD candidate Maia Casna was a guest on the new episode of the Wetenschappelijke Wezens podcast. In it, Maia discusses her research on urbanisation and respiratory diseases while uncovering the intricacies of studying the human past and bones.

PhD student Wen Yang discovered how certain cell receptors in E. coli bacteria signal 'smells'. With the use of ice-cold electron microscopy microbiologists from Leiden gain more insight into how bacteria respond to their environment. Publication in mBio.

This summer postdoctoral researcher Mónica Varela from the Institute of Biology Leiden was awarded a Veni grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO). Six questions about her project and hopes for the future.

Research aims: Identification of key genes involved in programming the cellular architecture of A. niger & Genetic engineering of A. niger in order to improve its secretory capacities and rheological behavior under industrial fermentation conditions.

How do macrophages and neutrophils contribute to metastatic onset?

This functional genomics project aims at understanding the biology of the underlying mycelium differentiation and autolysis processes in much more detail.

What are key regulators of plant ageing that can reverse ageing in plants (rejuvenation), and how can we use this knowledge to improve crop plants?

The master's specialisation Health and Medical Psychology consists of three main parts: the mandatory and elective courses, a thesis and an internship.

At Leiden University, in both our biomedical and biological research, we use laboratory animals. Learn more about these specific areas of research and the goals we aim to achieve through these studies.